Cabbage casserole and Banana fritters…

Aaargh, who ever claimed to be catching up with recipes? It wasn’t me, was it? Nooo, definitely not me! Anyway, I’m back home with Buzz again, which means more cooking than usual, and therefore more pressure on blogging about it as well…

I already arrived on Thursday and was lucky enough to be able to sit down at a laid table – we finished Buzz’ chicken soup and chicken salad on Thursday and Friday, had a Pizza on Saturday and a Cabbage casserole with blue cheese on Sunday and today. Actually, officially it’s a Savoy Cabbage and Mince Meat Casserole, but we ended up using Chinese cabbage anyway.

 

Savoy Cabbage and Mince Meat Casserole

1 cabbage head (appr. 600 g, but 1 kg will be fine as well); use savoy or chinese (or any other) cabbage
2 tomatoes
1-2 onions
500 g mince meat
300 g Roquefort or any other blue cheese
200 g cream
2 eggs

Clean the cabbage and cut into 1-2 cm thick slices; boil in salted water until done but still crisp; this may take around 10 min for savoy cabbage, says my cookbook, but the chinese cabbage was done within 5-6 min. Drain the cabbage in cold water so that it doesn’t continue to cook.

Drop the tomatoes into boiling water, then peel and de-seed them and cut them into chunks. Chop the onion and fry together with the mince meat. When that is done, add the tomato and half of the blue cheese (in crumbles), and let the cheese melt; but be careful not to let it get burned!

Grease a casserole and fill with half of the cabbage. Mix the eggs and the cream, season with salt and pepper, and pour half of the mixture on the cabbage. Then add the mince meat mix and top with the rest of the cabbage, pour the other half of the cream-egg-mix and scatter the rest of the blue cheese on top. Pop into the oven and bake at 220°C for about half an hour.

 
Notes:

I quite enjoyed this casserole. I was a little sceptical about how the blue cheese would blend in, but I was pleasantly surprised. Nonetheless, the taste of the blue cheese was quite strong; I suppose it might not have turned out that way if we really had used a Roquefort and not a stronger (and cheaper) Danica Blue, so it’s definitely worth it to either choose a milder blue cheese, or mix the blue cheese with another mild and creamy cheese (Buzz’ suggestion is a goat’s cheese, but somehow that doesn’t really fit my definition of creamy mild cheese…)

Serves 4-6; adapted from Cornelia Adam’s Aufläufe, Gratins und Soufflés.

 

Banana fritters

2-4 bananas
a little flour
more cold (very cold!) water
   (try 1 part flour and 2 parts water to begin with)
2-3 tbsp. sesame seeds
a few tbsp. sugar
a dash of salt
oil for deep-frying

I’m sorry that I can’t give more precise measurements for this recipe. I’ve seen it somewhere recently and really liked the idea, but I can’t remember where I’ve seen it, and so I had to go by memory and intuition.

Anyway. Make a batter from all ingredients except for the bananas. The batter should be relatively liquid. I started out with only a tablespoon or so of sugar, but I kept adding at least two or three more tablespoons of it as the bananas became crisper and less bland. The batter should be cold, so consider placing the bowl in a larger one filled with cold water to keep the temperature down.

Peel and slice the bananas, cover them with batter and fry them in small batches, and serve (warm, preferably).

 
Notes:

Make sure that the batter is liquid, and that it is cold; that will ensure that the bananas are only surrounded by a thin, light and crisp batter. Furthermore, add enough sugar (but not too much, remember that fried bananas release sugar as well!) if you find that your fried bananas are not yet crisp enough. Writing this, I think that letting the batter rest for a short time (anything between 10 and 30 minutes) might have a positive effect as well, so be sure to prepare the batter before sitting down for dinner.

I also rolled the last two banana slices in sesame seeds before covering them with batter – I can really recommend that! But you have to like sesame seeds…

Oh, and one last thing: these are Banana fritters, NOT Finger fritters, so keep you fingers outta there!

Serves 2; adapted from, ehm, my memory.

Rescuing my meal…

I haven’t blogged a lot in the last few weeks, my excuses for that; I have cooked, every now and then, and I will try to catch up with at least some of the recipes.

Tonight, I had Chicken with Creamy Bacon Penne. Actually, I was supposed to eat this dish two days ago; but then I discovered in the very last second that my cream had turned sour, and that the canned peas I bought because I couldn’t find any fresh ones were absolutely disgusting. Luckily, I still had a ripe avocado and a can of corn, so I added those together with a marinade of olive oil and vinegar, and voilà, there was my Easy Pasta Salad (you can throw in a lot of other ingredients if you wish, fresh tomatoes, dried tomatoes, cucumber, carrots (slightly braised?), feta or mozzarella cheese, braised broccoli, …)

 

Chicken with Creamy Bacon Penne

1-2 chicken breast(s), cut in strips
a small pack of bacon
(1-2 small onions, chopped)
4 tbsp. white wine
a few carrots, finely sliced
a small pack of peas
5 tbsp. double cream/1 cup single cream
Pasta

Fry the bacon, the chicken and the onions. If you prefer crispy bacon, fry the bacon first until its half-done, then add the chicken and the onions. Add the carrots, fry a little longer, then add the white wine. When the wine has nearly evaporated, add the peas, the cream and possibly some water, and cook for a couple of minutes until the peas are done.

The original recipe calls for instant pasta which I didn’t have (and never would buy); I had to cook the pasta separately, and so strictly speaking this wasn’t a one-dish meal anymore, as the cookbook’s title suggested. However, if you prepare the double amount of bacon, chicken and pasta, you could end up with a two-in-one meal, eating Chicken with Creamy Bacon Penne on the first day and the Easy Pasta Salad on the next.

Serves 2-3; adapted from the BBC Good Food Series’ 101 One-pot Dishes.

 

Easy Pasta Salad

Pasta
1-2 chicken breast(s), cut in strips
a small pack of bacon
4 tbsp. white wine
1 ripe avocado
1 can of corn
any other ingredient (fresh tomatoes, dried tomatoes, cucumber, carrots (slightly braised?), feta or mozzarella cheese, braised broccoli, … see note above)
olive oil and vinegar

Fry the bacon, and the chicken. Add the white wine and cook until the wine has nearly evaporated. Mix with the pasta, adding the corn and spoonfulls of avocado, and any other vegetable, and serve with a dressing of olive oil and vinegar.

Serves 2-3; a family recipe.